Grades and faith helped Jaclyn survive her time in foster care

Senior standouts:
Striving teenager comes to master a great many pursuits
Perkins, Olivera. Cleveland Plain Dealer, May 2, 2007.

Head of the Class
Jaclyn Lee approached her high school career with the deftness of a master juggler who keeps many things in motion, rarely dropping the ball.

She has stayed near the top of her class while serving as student council vice president, a peer tutor, a leader in the peer mediation program, a player on one of the school's junior varsity basketball teams and a member of the gospel choir.

As if that is not enough, Jaclyn has been an American Red Cross volunteer and a youth Bible study teacher at her church.

She has juggled all of these activities while working part time at a fast-food restaurant and at times, dealing with problems at home.

Jaclyn will attend Baldwin-Wallace College, where she will receive $25,000 in scholarships and be in the honors program. She wants to be a Certified Public Accountant, and plans to study accounting and business management in an accelerated program where she will receive both a bachelor's and master's degree in five years.

Jaclyn, daughter of John Lee and Cheryl Murray, says she has always excelled academically because she not only places a high value on education, but also has a fervent desire to never give up. As a peer tutor, she made these personal qualities infectious for the students she has helped.
Jaclyn believes in the power of education for herself as well as others. She says that at one point she and an older sister were placed in foster care for several months, part of which included Jaclyn's freshman year in high school.

School activities and her studies were Jaclyn's escape.

"My grades were about the only thing I could control. That is why I worked so hard in school to do well," she says.

Her faith in God helped to keep her focused.

"I've always had a strong, strong, strong relationship with God," she says. "I knew even though I was going through a lot emotionally – and it was tearing me up – I knew there was a reason for it."